Karen touched the corner of Janet’s folder.
Janet looked at her.
Then my wife sat straighter.
“I remember enough,” Janet said.
The attorney paused.
“I’m not suggesting otherwise.”
“You just did.”
The room changed.
Small, but real.
The risk manager stopped smiling.
Karen opened the blue folder. Not the copy. The original. Janet had brought it herself, soft corners and all. She placed the hospital summary on the table. Then the first email. Then the second. Then the resident complaint log. Then the access report. Then the maintenance override record. Each paper landed gently, but the sound gathered.
“Your company was notified of the door issue in June,” Karen said.
She placed a page down.
“Again in July.”
Another page.
“Again in August.”
Another.
“And again six days before the incident.”
Mark Ellison leaned forward.
“Our understanding is that the door was functional at the time.”
Karen slid a photograph across the table. It showed the latch taped by a resident because it had failed again the morning after Janet’s incident.
“Your understanding appears to have been budget-friendly.”
No one laughed.
That made it better.
Then Karen opened the binder containing Terry Booth’s statement. He claimed he had closed the elevator service ticket remotely because the issue “self-resolved.” He claimed the camera override was automatic. He claimed he did not remember being in the building that night.
Karen placed the vendor log beside his statement.
“His keycard remembered.”
The silver-haired attorney looked at the page.
For the first time, his face lost its polish.
Mark Ellison turned to the risk manager, who looked down at her tablet and did not look back up.
Janet was breathing carefully beside me. I could hear each inhale. Controlled. Measured. Present.
The attorney tried one more door.
“Mrs. Bradley, you waited many months to pursue this matter fully. From our position, that delay complicates—”
“No,” Janet said.
One word.